The Blake Adventures: It Takes a Village
by AndAllThatMishigas
Summary: A new addition to the Blake household causes Lucien to take the mysterious murder of a local woman quite personally. Jean must help him overcome his distractions to find the killer.
1. Chapter 1

**The Blake Adventures: It Takes a Village**

 _October 1961_

Lucien Blake arrived home midday feeling very excited. He took off his jacket and hat by the front door and called for his wife. "Jean? Jean, I've got something to show you!"

"We're in the kitchen," she shouted back at him, unable to go to him at that particular moment.

He rounded the corner and found her sitting in a chair, turned away from the table and toward the stove. Lucien knew very well what she was doing. He'd come home many times to a similar scene. "Ah. Do you think you should be shouting like that?"

Jean turned her head toward him as best she could. "I think you'll find she's perfectly fine. With all the noise you make around the house, I don't think a bit of shouting will faze her at all."

Lucien walked around the table to stand in front of her. He leaned forward slightly to gently stroke soft brown curls with his finger, trying not to disturb the tiny being Jean was holding. "How is she today?"

"Your daughter has been rather obstinate this morning. Wasn't happy anywhere but in my arms," Jean sighed.

"So when she isn't cooperating, she's _my_ daughter, is that right?"

She smirked. "Well she certainly drinks like you do, look at her!" she teased, gesturing to the baby feeding on her breast.

Lucien laughed as he kissed Jean on the cheek. "I'm sorry she's been difficult. Let me know how I can help."

"After she's finished, if you could take her for a while? I haven't been able to get a single thing done all morning."

He nodded. "Of course. She can join me when I meet with Mr. Claxton later."

"No, Mr. Claxton had to reschedule. You don't have any patients this afternoon," she informed him.

Lucien smiled. "Oh that is good. Now I can spend the day learning this!"

She regarded him curiously. "Learning what?"

He reached over to the bag he'd brought in and pulled out some pages of sheet music to show her. "I was in the music shop today, just looking around, and I found the music for this American song. Apparently it was mildly popular a few years ago. And I simply had to have it."

Jean saw the title and grinned. "You'll have to sing it for us. You go practice and we'll join you in a bit."

Lucien looked at the baby and got a dreamy expression on his face. That look always made Jean simply melt. She could not get over how besotted he was with their baby. They both were, really. They had been blessed with the most incredible little girl, no matter how much she cried and kept them awake and frustrated all the time. She was perfect.

"I take it you'd like to wait for her to finish her lunch before going to play the piano."

He blinked, breaking the baby's spell, looking at Jean sheepishly. "If it isn't too much trouble."

Jean just shrugged. "I don't know why you'd want to be here. It isn't interesting to watch me feed the baby. I do it all the time."

"Yes, I know but…I don't quite know what it is. I suppose I'm just fascinated by the miracle of it. Of course, I know how breastfeeding works; I'm a doctor, and I help women who have trouble with it all the time. But there is something about _you_ feeding _our daughter_ …" he trailed off, getting that dreamy expression again.

"Were you like this when Li was a baby?" she asked. It still felt strange to ask Lucien about his first wife and first child. He was much more open to talking about them than he used to be. And it didn't upset him at all to speak about them. Nevertheless, Jean was never quite sure if she was pressing too far by asking.

But Lucien replied without hesitation. "No, but that was very different. I don't think Mei Lin breastfed after the first few weeks. We had a wet nurse and a nanny. It was the way things were done at the time. I didn't think much of it then."

Just then, the baby moved her face away, making gurgling noises. Jean shifted her and asked, "All finished? Alright, sweet girl, your father is going to play a song now, just for you."

"Ah yes. I'll go figure this out then."

"Yes, if you don't want her to spit up on you, you'd better go now," Jean warned as she buttoned her blouse.

Not wanting to repeat the events of trying to 'help' a few weeks earlier, Lucien vacated the kitchen. He took the sheet music to the piano and sight-read his way through it, trying to get the key and syncopation right.

"It sounds quite nice so far," Jean noted from where she stood, bouncing the baby and patting her back to get all those pesky air bubbles out of her system. "But I thought you were going to sing."

"Needy woman, that wife of mine," Lucien muttered to himself. He turned back to the beginning of the song and played the melody line once through quickly to get the proper pitch. "Right, here we go," he announced. With a bit of a flourished introduction, he began to sing, "Valerie, my one and only. Valerie, don't leave me lonely. Stay here with me oh can't you see, I love you, Valerie."

After the first verse, Jean entered the room with the baby in her arms. "You hear that, Valerie? That's you! Your dad's found a song just for you," she whispered to her tiny daughter.

Lucien looked up momentarily to flash a proud grin in between verses. He continued singing, "Valerie, my heart is beating. Valerie, it keeps repeating, You're so divine, you must be mine. Come to me, Valerie."

Jean began swaying in place along with the music, dancing gently beside the piano and humming along with the melody.

The song finished with several repetitions of the name, Valerie. Lucien ended it and swung around on the piano bench to face his wife and child. "And there we have it. A song called Valerie, just for our Valerie."

"It's lovely, Lucien. You'll have to teach it to me. We can add it to the songs we sing to her at bedtime."

"I think we'll be able to harmonize nicely with it," he predicted. "It's originally a doo-wop song, so it's meant to be sung by more than one person. We'll play around with it and see what we like." He stood up and took the baby from Jean's arms. "Now that we've done that, I promised father-daughter time. Mum needs to accomplish some things, so it looks like it's just you and me for now, Valerie."

Jean watched them for a moment. Valerie was calmly and quietly gazing up at her father, acting the perfect angel. Jean huffed, "Valerie Genevieve Blake, that is not fair! Lucien, she's been a nightmare all day, but the moment you come home and sing her a song, she's fine! Now I know Mattie is just teasing when she says the baby likes you better than me, but now I'm starting to believe it!"

Lucien held Valerie up to look at her eye to eye. "Now, Valerie, that isn't nice. You've got the best mother in the world, so you treat her well. She sings to you just as much as I do. And she's the one who feeds you, so it's impolite to give her this much trouble."

Valerie just stared, her blue eyes matching his.

Jean started to laugh. "Alright, you two go find something to do somewhere else. I really have to do the dusting and vacuuming today."

But as Jean turned to go start on the housework, the telephone rang. Jean swore under her breath and went to answer it. Lucien waited where he was, gently rocking Valerie in his arms. He planned on taking her into his study with him, but he also knew that a telephone call was for him more often than not. Best not go too far just yet.

After a moment, Jean returned. "Lucien, that was Chief Superintendent Carlyle," she told him with a heavy sigh. "Give the baby to me. You're needed for a body. I wrote down the address by the phone."

"I am sorry, Jean. I'll be back as soon as I can," he promised.

"I know. But do send Charlie, if you can. I'm so far behind today, I may need him to help with dinner," Jean noted.

Lucien cocked his head, thinking. "Perhaps I should start learning to cook. For when Charlie can't be home to help."

Jean tried not to laugh. "You did attempt to cook once. Or have you forgotten the disaster that was breakfast in bed on my last birthday?"

"Ah. Yes, perhaps I'd better not."

"Go to work, love. We'll be fine here," she assured him, pushing him toward the door as she kissed him goodbye.


	2. Chapter 2

Lucien arrived at the crime scene, unsure of what he was to find. It was an ordinary house on an ordinary street in Ballarat. This one just happened to have police cars all around it.

"Ah, Blake, glad you made it. A cause of death and time of death, if you could," Frank Carlyle said, not wasting time on small talk.

He led the doctor inside the house. The sound of a baby crying echoed through the hall. Lucien immediately felt tense. "Is that child alright?" he asked with concern.

"We think so. The mother is with him now. The deceased is the nanny. Mother and father were both out all day and came home to a crying baby and this." The chief superintendent moved aside in the nursery, revealing the body of a young woman. Lucien's first thought was that she looked a bit like Mattie. Pale skin, auburn hair.

"What's her name?" Lucien asked, his tone gravely serious.

"Melinda Larkin."

Lucien got onto the ground to begin his initial examination of the body. "She's been here a while. Alice will have to do some tests to be sure, but I'd say she was killed at least a few hours ago." He continued his inspection. "Ah, yes, here, the bruising on the neck is starting to show."

"She was strangled?"

But Lucien barely heard what Frank was saying. The sound of the baby's cries was boring into his head, consuming his mind. His vision began to tunnel on the faint bruises on the nanny's neck.

"Dr. Blake? Lucien!"

Frank's sharp tone snapped him out of it. "Y-yes. She was strangled. You can transport her to the morgue now. Alice can do the autopsy."

Without another word, Lucien stood up and walked hastily out of the house. The baby was still crying. Even after he'd gotten back in his car, he still heard the sound. He turned on the engine and began to drive.

He kept on driving. He didn't know where he was going or what he was doing. He just focused on the roar of the engine. Anything to drown out that baby's cries.

Eventually the noise in his head quieted down. Lucien realized he'd driven quite a ways out of town, and the sun was dipping low in the sky. Jean would be wondering where he was. He needed to get home to his family.

"I didn't know if you would be home for dinner or not," Jean said, going to greet him as he came in the front door. She leaned up to kiss his cheek, but he caught her on the lips, hard. She pulled away with surprise. "Oh. Goodness. I've kept a plate warm for you."

"Where's Valerie?" he asked, not answering anything she said to him.

"In the nursery. It's past her bedtime. Though I doubt she's fallen asleep yet."

He took the stairs two at a time going up to see his daughter. She was laying in the bassinet, her bright blue eyes shining up at him. Lucien had hoped that seeing her would calm him down. It had the opposite effect. A sick feeling gripped his insides. And all he wanted to do was drown it.

Jean hadn't rushed coming upstairs. Though it seemed she should have. Lucien was leaving the nursery. He had a vacant, distant expression and brushed past her, barely noticing. Jean watched him rush off again, a concerned frown on her face. Instead of going after him again, she continued to Valerie's room.

Even after moving into Lucien's room—their room—Jean still felt a sense of calm and comfort going into her old bedroom. After all, she'd lived there for so long. It was the only place she had of her very own. And as happy as she was to have a marital bed with her husband, it was still nice to remember having her own space. But now it belonged to their Valerie. Jean was glad she'd insisted on waiting to find out if the baby was a boy or a girl before they painted the room. She was glad to keep the pink walls. They felt happy, even in the dark.

Leaning over the bassinet, Jean whispered, "Your father is a wonderful man but he is rather infuriating most of the time. But just remember, Valerie, that even when he gets a little lost, he'll always come back to us. Because he might not always know how, but he loves us so very much. More than anything. He'll always be here for me and for you. He'll make sure of it."

As Jean gazed into the baby's eyes, she noticed, not for the first time, that Valerie had inherited Lucien's eyes. She was glad. If such a thing were possible, it felt like she loved Valerie just a little more because she could look at her and see that bit of Lucien. Christopher and Jack had both grown into their father's personality, albeit in different ways; she never saw their father in them as blatantly as she saw Lucien in Valerie. Though Christopher and Jack were small so very long ago. Time plays such strange tricks on the memory.

She watched the baby begin to drift off to sleep for a few minutes longer. That was one thing that hadn't changed about motherhood. Jean could just watch her children forever. Tiny little miracles, all of them.

Downstairs, Lucien had tried to escape his anxiety in the best way he could. He went out to the garage, removed his waistcoat and shirt, haphazardly wrapped up his hands, and began incessantly hitting the punching bag he'd hung in the corner.

As soon as he'd found out Jean was pregnant, he had immediately tried to stop drinking. Not that he had been drinking very heavily after they'd gotten married, but he didn't want to be in that state at all when they had a child in the house. Jean hadn't said much about his decision. She did, however, point out that he needed some way to relieve stress in the way the whiskey had functioned when he'd really needed it. Boxing seemed the next best thing. Instead of getting drunk until he passed out, he would box until he was so exhausted, his mind wouldn't even function.

And so here he was. He felt the heat of his own body. He felt the sweat drip from his forehead and soak his vest. But he kept going. Until the sickness in his stomach was dulled by the exertion of his body.

Jean had known instinctively that he'd gone to the garage. She hadn't even bothered looking anywhere else. If he was at the point where he needed this, something had happened to really upset him. She knew he would tell her eventually, and if he didn't, she would ask. But just for now, she understood that this was what he needed.

And seeing him in the dim light, sweat glistening off the thick, rippling muscles of his back and arms, Jean couldn't look away. The old scars on his back peeked out of the sides of his singlet. Jean could practically feel the texture beneath her fingers. He made a visceral grunting noise, and her breath caught in her throat. When he changed his stance, her eyes followed the curve of his trousers. She unconsciously licked her lips and swallowed hard.

With one final right hook, Lucien ceased. He finally put his arms down as he panted to catch his breath. He was starting to come back to his body, wading through the cloud of stress and panic. And he had the strangest feeling that he was being watched. He turned and saw Jean in the doorway. There was a look in her eyes he knew quite well now, after almost three years of marriage. It was a hunger only he could satisfy.

As if to confirm his thoughts, Jean lightly bit her lower lip. Her pulse was beginning to quicken as her whole body began to vibrate with lust and anticipation.

They didn't utter a single word. They silently took steps toward the center of the room, each meeting the other in the middle. For a single moment, they stood there, staring into each other's eyes with the most intense yearning.

Neither could be sure who made the first move, but the next thing they knew, they had begun kissing fervidly. Lips and tongues moved together, teeth grazing skin and nipping with unbridled passion. Lucien's hands were shaking as he unbuttoned Jean's blouse, pushing it off her as quickly as he could. She had tried to undo his trousers but couldn't seem to connect her brain to her hands, especially not after his mouth descended upon her chest. Her knees were too weak to keep her upright. But he held her tight, carefully leading them both to the dusty garage floor.

His hands seemed to be everywhere. Rough but gentle, as always. The harsh scratch of his beard contrasted with the warm softness of his tongue as his mouth made its way all around her body. He practically ripped her skirt and foundation garments off her before rolling them over so she lay on top of him. She recaptured his lips with hers while he reached between them, unzipping his trousers and ridding himself of his remaining clothes.

From where she sat on him, straddling his stomach, he could already feel that she was ready for him. He had to break their kiss to lift her up and guide himself into her. Jean gasped, shifting her hips to accommodate him. Lucien moaned loudly. She silenced him with a kiss as she began to move on him.

Somewhere in the distant reality of her mind, Jean felt some pain from having her knees on the cold, hard ground. She slowed to a stop, trying to readjust. Lucien sat up so she could wrap her legs around his waist. Feeling much more comfortable, she gyrated against him and rocked back and forth, clutching wildly at his shoulders and back.

As the pressure built within her, her movements became more erratic. She bit down on the bulging muscle of his shoulder to keep from screaming out in ecstasy.

Lucien almost laughed. Of all the things he'd anticipated in their marriage, their love life had been the most unexpected, wondrous thing. She'd been enthusiastic from the beginning, if a bit inhibited. It hadn't taken long for her to trust him to bring her pleasure. And very quickly, he'd found that her proper façade melted away to this unhinged passion. Every time, Lucien didn't know he could love her any more, but every time he found that he did.

When they were both finally spent, they continued to clutch each other, breathing heavily and slowly returning to a normal heart rate.

Jean was the first to regain the power of speech. "Here, let me get off you. This can't be comfortable."

But he just wrapped his arms around her lithe body, still rounder than usual from the pregnancy and breastfeeding. "Don't you dare move," he murmured, placing hot open-mouthed kisses on her neck and shoulders.

"Just lie down," she softly insisted. He gradually loosened his hold on her and leaned back until his sweat-covered back lay flat on the cold ground.

Jean extricated herself from him and began looking for all her clothes. She only needed enough to go into the house and to the bedroom for a bath before bed. She stood and zipped up her skirt with nothing underneath. Lucien watched her dress with a smile on his face.

"Feeling better?" she asked with a smirk.

"Oh yes, much," he replied with a laugh. "I do love you."

She gave a curt nod in response, but couldn't fully suppress her smile. As she found the sleeves of her blouse, she asked, "What were you doing out so late? Whatever it was brought you out here."

Lucien finally sat up, running his hands down his face, remembering what was waiting for him outside the safe comfort of their home. "A nanny was brutally strangled. The baby was left unharmed, but it was hours before anyone came home and found the poor girl. And that baby wouldn't stop crying," he told her.

Jean consciously chose to avoid the personal aspect of what he had said, for now at least. "What did the autopsy reveal?" she asked.

"I don't know. I didn't go to the morgue. I…I couldn't. I couldn't get that crying out of my head. I drove until I couldn't hear it anymore. Then I came home. And here we are."

She leaned down, trailing her hand from his hair and down his face and beard to rest on his jaw. "Lucien, that wasn't Valerie. Valerie doesn't have a nanny. Nor will she ever. No one will ever leave her alone like that," Jean vowed.

He tried to smile, to reassure her that he understood her words. But he couldn't seem to manage it. "Jean, if anything ever happened to you or to me…I can't leave her. I can't leave my daughter. Not again. Not this time."

Jean could see he was going to get overwhelmed if he kept this up. She took his face in both her hands and force him to look into her eyes. "Lucien, we're in Ballarat. Safe, boring Ballarat. Nothing can happen to us here."

"It happened to Melinda Larkin."

"And that is a tragedy. But that isn't going to happen to us. I'm with Valerie all day, every day. And I will die before I let any harm come to our daughter."

"I don't want harm to come to you, either."

"Our family isn't like Melinda Larkin," Jean told him firmly.

"How do you know?"

"Well, we don't know yet. But you'll never know if you don't get down to that morgue and do the autopsy. You aren't going to be able to rest until you figure out what happened to her. So go do it. And I don't want you back in this house until you've found something." With that, Jean wrapped her blouse tightly around her, not bothering to button it up, and carried the rest of her clothes into the house.

Lucien stood up almost immediately. He redressed himself with newfound determination. Jean was right. He had work to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Lucien arrived in the morgue very late in the evening. He was surprised to find Dr. Harvey still there working.

"I don't know the last time I did an autopsy all on my own," she mused aloud, not letting him even greet her before she spoke. "It was very quiet. Which was useful but a bit weird, I'll admit."

"Well, I'm sorry I wasn't here. I thought you'd be finished by now."

"Sometimes I like to take my time. Especially when some manic man isn't itching to solve a mystery," she said pointedly.

Lucien frowned, feeling mildly offended.

But Alice just smirked. "Come along then, time to dive in."

It didn't take them more than an hour to finish. They confirmed that Melinda had been strangled, by great force. The hyoid bone was completely decimated, and finger marks had appeared in the dark bruising on her neck.

"Right, I'll head over to the station and talk to Frank," Lucien offered.

"It's nearly midnight. He won't be there. And you should probably go home to your family," Alice suggested.

Lucien couldn't help but look back to the poor murdered nanny on the exam table. His heart began to beat fast again. "Yes, I should get home," he agreed quickly.

Everyone was in bed asleep when Lucien arrived at the house. He immediately went up to the nursery. Valerie was sleeping soundly. He sat in the rocking chair beside her bassinet and watched her. He knew he should change out of his clothes and get to bed. But he couldn't seem to get up. He didn't want to look away from the baby.

The next morning, Jean awoke to find herself alone. It wasn't very often anymore that Lucien didn't come to bed. She looked out the bedroom window and saw the car parked out front. He must have come home. A knot formed in her stomach when she remembered how upset he'd been last night. He did have some self-destructive habits, and Jean was instantly terrified that he'd fallen back into them.

The faint sounds of crying sounded. Just like clockwork. Valerie needed her breakfast. Jean put on her dressing gown and went to the nursery, trying not to panic about Lucien. She'd take care of Valerie and then find her husband.

But when she arrived in the nursery, she found Lucien sitting in her rocking chair, holding the baby. Jean exhaled in relief. "How long have you been here?"

"All night. I got back just after midnight and fell asleep looking at her. Were you worried?"

"Yes, actually, I was. You weren't quite yourself last night."

"I didn't hear you complain. Quite the opposite, I think," he teased suggestively.

Jean blushed, her lips pursed together as she tried not to smile. "Stop it. I need to feed the baby, and you need a bath, I'm sure."

He obliged by standing from the chair and placing the baby in Jean's arms when she sat. But rather than going to bathe, he remained in the room. Jean was used to it by now.

"What did the autopsy turn up?" she asked, hoping to get him to focus on the case he was supposed to be working on.

"She was strangled. By someone very strong. With his bare hands."

"His?"

"More than likely, yes. Women don't typically kill through strangulation. It's an expression of dominance and power, an act by a desperately angry man, more often than not," he explained.

Jean nodded. "Any suspects yet?"

"Not that I know of."

"You'll have to go into the station today and find out then." It was still bothering her that he wasn't as focused on this case as he usually was. Jean had hoped that she'd been able to calm him down and talk sense into him, but obviously it hadn't quite sunk in.

"I will, yes. Do I have any patients today?" he asked.

"Yes, Mr. Claxon is coming in at two. So you've got all morning to investigate and be clever," she told him with a smile.

He chuckled. "I'll see what I can do. What are you up to today?"

"I have to do some shopping. It's quite a hassle to take Valerie out with me. Everyone in town just flocks to her," Jean complained.

"Well, she is quite pretty. As is her mother."

"You're in quite the mood this morning!"

"Perhaps I'm just remembering our evening in the garage."

"Lucien!" she scolded. "I know she doesn't understand now, but I do hope you'll have a little more self-control as Valerie gets older."

"I'm sorry Jean, but you're to blame. I simply cannot be expected to control myself around you," he teased.

She just rolled her eyes. Valerie had gotten her fill, so Jean put herself back together and placed a cloth on her shoulder to burp the baby. Lucien took that as his cue to get his day started.

About an hour later, Lucien arrived at the police station. Charlie greeted him. "Doc, the boss needs your report as soon as possible."

"I've got it here, Charlie," Lucien assured him. "Are there any suspects yet?"

Frank Carlyle rounded the corner, overhearing Lucien. "Not a single one. I hope that autopsy gave some indication, because we haven't got anything. Forced entry into the house, fingerprints on the door frame, but so far no match."

Lucien frowned. "She was strangled with a great deal of force, so a very strong man did this to her. No one fits the bill?"

Charlie explained, "According to the Andrews family, Melinda came to work for them two months ago. She was new in town and didn't give any information about herself beyond a list of references. The family didn't bother to check any of them. We found they were all fake phone numbers."

"So we don't know anything about her at all?" Lucien asked in disbelief.

Frank just shrugged. "We were hoping the autopsy would give us something."

"Sorry to disappoint," Lucien replied bitterly. "We don't even know where she came from?"

"No. And that's why we're going to put her picture and description in the newspaper. See if anyone knows anything that could help us," Frank explained.

In some sick way, Lucien was glad there were no leads for him to investigate. Nothing to grab his attention. Because his attention was still elsewhere. "Charlie, give me a call if anything turns up or if I'm needed. I've got patients this afternoon, so I'll be home the rest of the day."

Charlie just nodded and watched the doctor leave. He'd never known Dr. Blake to accept defeat like this, to not push for a new theory on a case. But at least if he was going home, Jean could keep an eye on him and make sure he kept himself together.

The house was empty when Lucien got home. Mattie and Charlie were both at work, and Jean had presumably taken Valerie to the market. He decided to go to the piano and practice Valerie's song.

Jean dressed had Valerie and put her in the pram, pushing it through town. It took quite a long time to get anything done this way, as it seemed everyone who knew her—and even people she'd barley met—wanted to look at the baby. Lucien was right, she was quite pretty, but Jean was sure it was more the novelty of the doctor and his housekeeper-turned-wife with a baby in their later years that attracted the attention. It made Jean feel equally flattered and like a sideshow attraction.

"What a beautiful child!"

Mother and daughter were stopped yet again, but this man Jean didn't recognize. "Thank you," she replied with cautious politeness.

"She's yours, eh?"

"Yes."

The man nodded. "She looks like you. It's nice to see a mother out with her child. Nowadays it seems everyone hires nannies to take care of their children. And that's no way to treat a baby. No way to treat a woman either, making her care for a baby that doesn't belong to her."

Jean felt all the hairs on her arms stand up. Something about this man made her feel like there was danger afoot. "I'm sorry, I don't think I caught your name, sir?"

He smiled, looking like a predator sizing up its meal. "Never you mind. Just take good care of that baby of yours, ma'am." And with that, he went on his way.

Even though she wasn't finished with her shopping, Jean paid for what she had and went straight home. She made a mental note to tell Lucien about that strange encounter.

She was surprised to hear the piano as she arrived back at the house. "I didn't know you'd be back so early," she said as she carried Valerie into the room.

Lucien immediately stopped playing and stood to greet them, giving each a kiss on the cheek. "The police don't have any leads in the case yet," he explained.

Jean frowned. "Then go find some."

"I have patients later."

"You have one patient in three hours from now. That's plenty of time to do something. Lucien, you're avoiding this case, and that isn't like you!"

He looked at his wife, completely unable to hide the distress on his face. "Jean, you've got to understand, things are different now…"

"No, nothing is different. We have a child. That's all. And that shouldn't change anything about the way you work. You do so much good, and you're such a help to the police. Now, I know they can manage without you, but that's never seemed to stop you before." Jean looked at him with fire in her eyes, daring him to contradict her.

He didn't dare. "I know you're right, Jean. You usually are." He sat down on a chair, leaning back with his hands on his face. "I just can't seem to focus."

Jean shifted Valerie in her arms so she could put a gentle hand on her husband's shoulder. "How can I help?"

"Well right now we don't have anything at all. Melinda was new to Ballarat. No one knows where she came from. The family she worked for didn't have any information helpful to the police."

"Did you ask them?"

"No, Frank told me."

"Perhaps you should ask them yourself," Jean recommended. "See if there's been any visitors to the house that they know of. Anyone calling or writing to Melinda. Or if any of the neighbors saw anything."

"Yes, I should," Lucien agreed half-heartedly.

Jean paused for a moment, waiting to see if he'd do anything else. When he didn't speak, she decided to change the subject. Sometimes getting his mind off a case would give him an idea. "A man came up to us today at the market."

That instantly caught his attention. Lucien sat up. "What man?"

"He didn't give his name. I've never seen him before. He commented on how pretty Valerie is and seemed rather impressed that I took care of her myself instead of a nanny. It made me a bit uncomfortable, actually."

Lucien's face went blank as the wheels of his mind began to turn. "You've never seen him before, and he mentioned something about a nanny? Strange coincidence after Melinda's death."

Jean's mouth spread into a half-smile. She'd had the exact same thought. "There's a lead for you. You'd better get to work."

He stood up and turned to her, putting his hand on her cheek affectionately. "What would I do without you?" he asked with a loving smile.

"Luckily that's not something we need to worry about. You go on now," she encouraged.

The house was once again empty for Jean and Valerie to go about their day, since Lucien had now jumped on the chance to contribute to the case.


	4. Chapter 4

When Lucien arrived at the police station, he was pleased to find that someone had come forward about Melinda. Charlie introduced them. "Doc, this is Wilbur Larkin, Melinda's brother. He was in town looking for her and saw her picture in the paper this afternoon."

The man looked distraught. "I can't believe I was too late. She ran off about two months ago, and I've been searching and searching."

Lucien sat down beside Mr. Larkin. "She ran off? Why was that?"

"She'd fallen pregnant. And I promised her we'd take care of the baby together, since the father wasn't anywhere to be found. I was going to take care of her. But Melinda's never been the most reliable person. Always overreacting to everything, never thinking things through. I wasn't surprised she'd done a runner, given the situation, but I was so worried about her and the baby," Mr. Larkin explained.

"Charlie, can I have a word with you for a moment, please?" Lucien asked, standing up. He turned back to Mr. Larkin momentarily. "Thank you so much for coming in. I'm sure the police will have more questions for you, and we appreciate your assistance in finding Melinda's killer."

Out of earshot, Charlie asked Lucien what was going on.

"I don't know if that man is actually Melinda Larkin's brother or not, but he's lying. Well, he's lying or else Melinda was," Lucien murmured.

"What do you mean?"

"Melinda Larkin was never pregnant."

"Why would Wilbur Larkin say she was?" Charlie asked curiously.

Lucien shrugged slightly. "As I said, either he's lying to us or she lied to him. Either way, the reason why will probably lead us toward her killer. Assuming he isn't sitting at your desk right now.

"Doc, that man is no killer. He's been crying and jumpy since he walked in!"

"I can't say for certain it is him," Lucien replied. "But you'd be amazed what kind of reaction people can have to guilt."

Lucien immediately went back to the morgue to check the body again. Alice was there, finishing up some work on another body.

"Glad to have you back so soon," she said sarcastically.

"Did you find anything in Melinda Larkin's reproductive organs?" he asked, ignoring her teasing.

"Nothing that wasn't completely normal for a woman her age."

"No evidence of a pregnancy? Miscarriage or abortion?"

Alice's eyes went wide. "No, not at all. Anything like that would have been immediately recognizable. Melinda Larkin has never been pregnant."

Lucien frowned. "No, I thought not. A man just came into the station, claiming to be her brother. Says she ran off after finding some man had gotten her pregnant."

A strange look crossed Alice's face. "He may have been lying about a pregnancy, but what if he wasn't lying about her running off? Maybe she had a different reason for it."

He followed her train of thought. "You didn't happen to X-ray the body, did you?"

"No, there wasn't any external indication that was necessary. But there could be older injuries that might be visible on an X-ray, even if she's healed."

Lucien nodded. "Call me if you find anything. I'm going to see what the family she worked for knows."

Meanwhile, back at the Blake residence, Jean was simultaneously trying to quiet Valerie and keep Mr. Claxon entertained. "I'm so sorry Dr. Blake is late. He does know you have an appointment today. But he has a case with the police at the moment, so I think he must have been detained by that, I'm afraid," she shouted over the baby's wailing cry. "Can I get you some tea?" she asked desperately.

"Yes, I suppose you should," Mr. Claxon replied resignedly.

Jean took the baby with her into the kitchen and tried bouncing and rocking her as she waited for the kettle. All she wanted right now was for Lucien to come home so he could put Valerie down for her nap and take care of the patient being neglected in the surgery. Jean did her best to keep everyone happy—and luckily most everyone in town now knew all too well about the doctor's erratic tendencies—but adding a fussy baby to the mix was rather overwhelming sometimes.

Mr. Claxon poked his head into the kitchen. "Mrs. Blake, I think I'll come back tomorrow at two instead, if that's alright. I can't stay much longer now. And I think you need that cup of tea more than I do."

"Yes, tomorrow at two will be fine. I'll make sure the doctor doesn't even attempt to leave the house at all. I'm sorry for the inconvenience," she apologized, trying not to appear too relieved that the house would be empty once again.

Lucien arrived back home not ten minutes later. "Jean, did Alice call?" he shouted as he hung up his hat. He didn't notice at first that there was quite a lot of noise in the house. The phonograph was playing and Valerie was crying. He made his way into the parlor.

"No, Alice hasn't called," Jean replied. She had the crying baby in her lap as she sat on the sofa. Her voice barely carried over the music. There was an untouched cup of tea sitting on the end table beside her.

He saw something in his wife's face that he'd rarely seen before, and it petrified him every time. He looked into her turquoise eyes and saw defeat. "Here, let me take her," he offered, picking their daughter up, hoping she would calm down.

But exactly when Lucien had taken her, the phone began to ring. Jean stood up and took the baby right back. "I'm sure that'll be Alice. You have work to do. I'll take her upstairs so you won't be disturbed." Jean switched off the phonograph and hurried up to the nursery to keep out of Lucien's way.

The heaviness of her voice and movements concerned him a great deal, but he answered the phone before thinking about anything else. As predicted, it was Alice. The X-rays had revealed that Melinda's arms and ribs had been broken and healed many times over. And, as Lucien had asked her to check, Melinda had a tan line on her left hand where a wedding band would have once sat. Lucien hung up the phone with the beginnings of an idea swirling in his mind, but he needed to figure some things out first.

Mattie arrived home after her nursing shift. "Good afternoon, Lucien," she greeted, seeing him standing by the telephone, staring at it. "Planning on making a phone call?"

"No, just finished one." He turned to his young friend and pasted a smile on his face. "How was your day, Mattie?" he asked congenially.

"Fine. Nothing out of the ordinary. How's your case coming? Charlie told me about that poor nanny."

"I think we're making progress. Listen, have you got plans tonight?"

"My only plans for the rest of the day involve seeing to Valerie so you and Jean can go out," Mattie replied knowingly.

Lucien smiled gratefully and gave Mattie a kiss on the forehead. "You are a good girl."

"Mum and Dad need time to themselves. Whether it's going out to dinner or solving a murder. And it's a big sister's job to look after the little one."

He chuckled. He did love the way both Mattie and Charlie had taken to Valerie, each often referring to her as their little sister in jest. Lucien and Jean thought of them all as their children of sorts, so it was nice that they felt similarly.

Mattie and Lucien both went up to the nursery to rescue Jean. Upon seeing her, Mattie could instantly tell that rescuing was exactly what Jean needed.

"Jean, Mattie is going to take Valerie for a while. I need your help, if you'd be so kind," Lucien said softly.

Nodding numbly, Jean handed the baby to Mattie and followed Lucien out. She didn't say anything as they got in the car. It wasn't until he took her hand and gave it a squeeze while he drove that she even changed expression, smiling at his affectionate touch.

Lucien began to explain what he'd found out from Alice's further work on the body, the things Wilbur Larkin had said, and the information Lucien had gleaned from the Andrews family about their deceased nanny. "So it seems that Melinda was escaping some sort of violent marriage when she came to Ballarat. She was apparently very jumpy when she first arrived, according to Mrs. Andrews, but she settled in rather quickly."

Jean listened patiently, trying to keep all the pieces of the puzzle in her mind and not fixate over whether or not Mattie would be able to handle Valerie's incessant crying. "What is it you need from me?" she asked once Lucien had concluded.

"I want to talk to Wilbur Larkin again and see if he was lying to us before or if he genuinely didn't know about Melinda's situation before she left Castle Main. Any insight you have would be invaluable. You have a tendency to see right to the heart of things like this," he told her.

Jean just nodded. She'd do her best to help him, even with her thoughts drifting back home to the baby.

When they walked into the station, however, Jean's attention was immediately fixated. "Lucien, I have an idea. Please just wait here and watch," she instructed quietly.

Lucien did as she asked, curious as to what she had planned.

As she walked into the main office, she went right up to the man she recognized from the market earlier that day. "Hello, it's nice to see you again," she said pleasantly.

Wilbur Larkin immediately smiled. "Nice to see you as well. Where's that beautiful baby of yours?"

"She's at home. We have a friend who watches her from time to time. It lets me do things by myself, you see. It's so tiresome to constantly have to look after a child. And our friend doesn't have any children yet, so it's perfectly alright," Jean replied, hoping that her acting was believable.

The words had their desired effect. Larkin stood up quickly, causing the chair to loudly fall behind him. "You've no right to do that! You've no right to shirk your duties as a mother and force them on some poor girl! How dare you!" He kept yelling, working himself to a near frenzy and grabbed at Jean, nearly catching her by the neck before she dodged him.

Bill Hobart and Charlie restrained Larkin within seconds. Frank came in, wondering what the shouting was about, but he was practically run over by Lucien.

"You get away from my wife!" Lucien shouted, taking Jean in his arms protectively. As the police took Larkin out of the room, he looked to check on her and was surprised to see that she was smiling. "Jean?"

"That's the man I saw in the market today. And after what you told me about Melinda, I thought I could get a rise out of him. He seems to have some anger over her position as a nanny." Jean's expression turned much more serious. "Lucien, I think he was her husband, not her brother. I think perhaps she never gave him any children of their own and hurt her for it. Whether she was a nanny before or not, seeing her caring for another woman's baby when she didn't have one of her own must have thrown him into a rage. You saw him just now."

"You mean to tell me you wanted him to attack you?"

"I didn't know if he would get violent like that, but I was hoping he'd do or say something incriminating, yes."

Lucien held her tight, kissing her hair. "I don't like when you put yourself in harm's way like that, but in the future, if that's what you're going to do, I hope you'll warn me."

"I will try to keep that in mind," she replied with a cheeky grin. "Now then, I think you and the police should go get a confession so this case can be closed. You didn't make Mr. Claxon's appointment today, so he's coming back tomorrow."

"Oh Mr. Claxon, I completely forgot!"

"I thought as much," she said knowingly.

"You wait here. This hopefully won't take too long. And I'd like to take you out for dinner."

"Lucien, I'm not dressed to go out to dinner!"

"You look lovely as always, and I think you're dressed perfectly to pick up some fish and chips," he replied.

After Lucien had left to interrogate Larkin, Jean took the momentary quiet to collect her thoughts. These last few days had been more than she'd been prepared to cope with. She'd known for quite some time that worrying about Lucien was a fulltime job. She did it quite well. She'd come to understand when he needed worrying about and when he was capable of handling himself alone; Mattie and Charlie were both getting good at it, but even they sometimes missed the signs. Lucien often told Jean not to worry about him, but she always told him the same thing: he was well worth worrying about, and she felt fortunate to be the one with that responsibility. Besides, the worry was just a small price to pay for all the love and excitement and joy and everything else that Lucien Blake provided. From the day he followed her to Adelaide, Jean knew she wouldn't give up their life for anything.

And now they had Valerie. She was the most perfect, beautiful, brilliant creation of their love and of their family. But in all the excitement of being pregnant again and getting to start a family with Lucien, Jean hadn't fully anticipated the reality of it. She wasn't as young as she once was, and while the experience of motherhood prepared her, Jean was unaccustomed to motherhood in this new life. Worrying about Lucien was still a fulltime job. Caring for a baby was as well. Jean kept trying to insist to Lucien that nothing had really changed, that they could still do everything they did before, they just got to add Valerie to the mix. Today had proved just how wrong Jean was.

Lucien returned to where Jean was waiting. "Finally got a confession," he announced. "You were almost exactly spot-on. He was her husband. He had been violent with her because they couldn't conceive, and she had run away as a result. When he did find her at the Andrews house, he confronted her because she had claimed that she never liked children and didn't want them, but she had become a nanny because she desperately wanted a baby but not from him. And that was when he grabbed her and left her dead on the floor."

Jean frowned. The entire story was too horrible to even contemplate. "Why would he come in to help your investigation, posing as a brother?"

"Probably to throw us off the trail. Perhaps to get a look at how we were doing and how close were to finding the killer. Though in this case, I think part of it may have been to disparage Melinda's character. The idea being that if she's painted as a wicked sort of woman, people feel less incentive for the crime to be solved," Lucien posited.

"Oh how awful."

"Indeed," he agreed. He took her hand. "Let's put this behind us and go get some dinner, eh?"

Jean nodded and followed him back out to the car. She stopped him before he turned on the engine. "I want to apologize."

"Oh? What for?"

"I've been thinking, and I can see now that you're right. Things are different now that we have Valerie. I thought I could handle everything so you wouldn't have to be away from your work at all, so you could keep on as before. I didn't want to allow anything to distract you from solving this or any other case. But I couldn't, and I'm sorry."

"Jean, do you know why I'm taking you out to dinner tonight?" he asked with a sad sort of smile.

"Because it's dinnertime and we're already out and I haven't got a thing prepared?"

"Well yes, but more so because I knew you needed a break from the house. You know, you are allowed to have time away from the baby. And I know you need it. Besides, I do still need you with me on my cases. I'm useless without you, in every regard."

Jean pressed her lips together, trying to refrain from too many emotions. "I thought I could do it myself, like I did before on the farm, but I can't. It's so different now. You're different and our lives are different and I'm much older."

Lucien sighed, "How many times do I have to tell you that I want to help? I want to be there, Jean, for whatever you need. Obviously you have to feed the baby, but I love getting to sing her to sleep with you every night, and I want to be more involved, if you'll let me."

"You have work…"

"This is more important. You and Valerie are more important than anything else. Besides, it's impossible to raise any child all alone. We've got a household full of people who want to help, so we should use them. Charlie and Mattie both love to babysit. I can do more, and you can relieve some of the burden. So just in the way that I can't do my work without you and Mattie and Charlie and everyone else, I don't think you should do your work without all of us too."

Somehow, Lucien had known and understood everything she was too afraid to ask him for. She couldn't help the tears running down her cheeks.

He pulled her into his arms. "Oh my darling Jean, you are so smart and capable and strong. But you can't be too strong to ask for help, because that will only weaken you over time. And, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that you and I are much stronger with each other than we've ever been alone."

Jean nodded emphatically.

He smiled. "I thought so. Now, no more tears. I know I said we'd eat out tonight, but I think instead we should take the fish and chips home. Because I, for one, haven't spent time with my daughter since early this morning, and I do miss her quite desperately."

Later that night, Jean and Mattie and Charlie and Valerie all sat in the parlor as Lucien played Valerie's song on the piano. Jean sat on the piano bench beside him and joined in for some harmonies while Mattie folded a load of laundry and Charlie entertained the baby. As she sang, Jean looked at this strange little family she'd found and saw right in front of her that, together, they could all make a truly wonderful life.


End file.
